Crime Reduction Strategy
The Government's Crime Reduction Strategy
This strategy was published on 29 November 1999.
Contents
ForewordCrime: a national audit
/ Raising Performance: the police and the Crime & Disorder reduction partnerships
/ Tackling vehicle crime
/ Dealing with disorder and anti-social behaviour
/ Dealing effectively with young offenders
/ Dealing effectively with adult offenders
/ Helping victims and witnesses
Conclusion
Crime Reduction Strategy
Home Secretary's Foreword
The government is embarked on a crusade against crime.
Safe and healthy communities need a strong, shared respect for the proper boundaries of the law and collective condemnation for all those who break them. Of course we need to understand the complex causes of crime and, wherever possible, offer a hand to help the offender back onto the right side. But we should all be clear that criminal behaviour is wrong.
We must, in other words, be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime.
Being tough on crime means sending clear signals to criminals that a return to crime will be met with clear consequences, that the purpose of our criminal justice system is to catch and punish offenders not to make excuses for them.
It means tough and consistent prison sentences for serious criminals, far more rigorous enforcement of community sentences and zero tolerance of anti-social behaviour. And it means quicker and more effective punishment for persistent young offenders.
Being tough on the causes of crime means strengthening communities by getting people off welfare and into work, by improving support for families and young children, by improving education, housing and action against truancy. It means proper investment to make our communities safer, in getting addicts off drugs and into treatment and making prison work by preventing re-offending and improving the literacy and employability of prisoners.
There is now less crime and more criminals are brought to justice. Since April 1997, total recorded crime has fallen by 9%. Vehicle crime is down 14% and burglary has fallen by 16%, whilst in 1998 the number of offenders convicted rose by 6%. And, for the first time ever last year’s British Crime Survey results showed that crime (including incidents not reported to the police) was on the way down, as was fear of crime.
We must not, however, be complacent.
Though recorded crime has fallen over the last six years, England and Wales remains the most crime prone area in Western Europe across a wide range of offences. Crime and the fear of crime can destroy the lives of innocent victims. But even if we are not directly affected, we all pay for high levels of crime. Crime can cost the UK economy in the order of £50 billion a year, reduce business profits, impose huge costs on the NHS, widen inequalities in wealth and opportunity, and make thousands of homes uninhabitable.
Patterns of crime change and our attitudes to crime change too. Drug addiction has become an increasingly powerful driver of property crime, while new types of consumer products like mobile phones or laptop computers have increased the stock of stealable goods. The public has also become, quite rightly, increasingly intolerant of disorder and anti-social behaviour; while more victims of crimes like domestic violence or racial crime, are willing to report their experiences to the police.
In addition to all of this, underlying economic and demographic pressures, over the next 3 years, mean that we will have to work harder than ever to reduce the levels of crime. These will be, for example, a 4% increase in young men under 18 - the age group in the population which we know accounts for a quarter of known offenders. Our greatest task, therefore, is to turn recent short-term gains into a long-term reduction in crime.
Over the past two years we have been laying the foundations for the most co-ordinated and coherent attack on crime in a generation. This strategy document sets out the next steps in the short to medium term. It is an audit of where we are now and where we are heading. During the next Spending Review we will be looking closely at the effectiveness of existing crime reduction policies and at possible new proposals. We are committed to using hard evidence as the basis of our approach for reducing crime. This underpins our £400 million crime reduction programme.
Raising the performance of the key players
At the heart of the strategy are the new steps we will be taking to ensure that every local crime fighting partnership and police force is performing to their maximum potential.
Reducing the crime rate in all police areas to the level of the average would reduce recorded crime by 200,000 offences. We want to aim higher. That will require:
· Clear targets for improvement
From April 2000 every police authority and local Crime & Disorder reduction partnership will have to set five year targets (and annual milestones) for the reduction of vehicle crime, of burglary and of robbery. For the police, the targets should at a minimum bring them level with the performance of the top 25 per cent of their peers. More importantly they will have to draw up convincing plans for how they will meet these targets which will be scrutinised by the Audit Commission and by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC).
· Clear information for the public
From January 2000 we will be publishing crime statistics not just for police force areas but also for individual police divisions (basic command units). For the first time the public will have a clear way of comparing crime in their town with that in other comparable places and, where they are lagging behind, be able to ask why.
· National leadership, support and scrutiny
To bring out the best from local councils and local police forces we need to provide strong leadership and support at a national level. That is why we are creating a new, high powered national Crime Reduction Taskforce bringing together senior figures from the police service and local government to oversee performance improvement at local, regional and national level. Alongside this body, new regional Crime Reduction Directors in every government region will scrutinise and support the performance of each local Crime & Disorder reduction partnership.
· New resources, tools and technology
We have already provided millions of pounds in new resources to pay for crime reduction projects in high crime areas and improvements to police effectiveness. Over the coming three years, we will be providing millions more, including the biggest ever investment in public CCTV security systems and a new ring-fenced crime fighting fund part of which will be used to enable forces to recruit, train and pay 5,000 new officers, over and above the number that forces would otherwise have recruited, over the next three years commencing in April 2000.
Tackling those crimes which most concern the public: burglary and vehicle crime
Government needs new strategies, new solutions, to deal with new problems. We need to take on those crimes which most concern the public. This strategy has a particular focus on burglary and on vehicle crime. If we can make significant progress in reducing these two types of offence (and this strategy maps out a clear way forward) we will have taken a very significant step towards making this country a safer place for all of us.
Funding from our Crime Reduction Programme is already helping to protect over 200,000 homes in high crime areas from burglary, with 1.8 million more to follow over the next two years. Our Vehicle Crime Reduction Action Team (VCRAT) has set out a clear route map for achieving our national target of a 30% reduction in vehicle crime, and new targeted policing initiatives around the country are starting to make a reality of our commitment to tackle crimes like drug dealing, town centre disorder and racial violence.
But there is more to come. Over the next three years we will be providing up to 150,000 low income pensioners with better home security and we will be building on our efforts to break the link between drug misuse and offending - particularly in relation to property crime - by providing the money for more arrest referral schemes, and by extending powers to drug test offenders.
Antisocial behaviour
It is not just the more serious recorded crimes which concern the public. Millions of people also find their quality of life suffering from vandalism, noisy or intimidating neighbours and out of control youngsters.
The criminal justice system often fails to deal with these types of problem. While individual episodes of antisocial behaviour might appear trivial, its relentless nature may have an even worse impact than a single, acute episode of crime. And there is now very clear evidence that a failure to nip disorder and anti-social behaviour in the bud, to repair vandalised windows or keep truants in school, can lead directly to more serious offences and higher crime rates, as well as higher fear of crime.
We have introduced new remedies for the police and local authorities to tackle serious antisocial behaviour. Coupled with sensible and sensitive targeted policing and much broader government programmes to build safe and secure communities we will achieve sustained, not transient, improvements.
Dealing effectively with those offenders who cause the most harm
Any national strategy to cut crime must also include a commitment to focus on those types of offenders who we already know account for a disproportionate amount of offending. That is why this strategy has a particular focus on young offenders who commit millions of offences a year and on drug addicted offenders who we know also steal hundreds of millions of pounds worth of property to fund their habits.
Most adult criminals learn their trade during their adolescence, so we should be dealing particularly effectively with young criminals. Yet by the time of the last election, this was not so. Repeat cautioning encouraged young offenders to believe that they could get away with their crime without punishment, and even when the system did intervene, it was slow, inefficient and largely ineffective. If a case got to court, the young offender would, at best, be a spectator in court - spoken over, round or about, but rarely spoken to, still less asked to explain his or her behaviour. At worst, offenders would hear adult professionals offering excuses for their crimes, buttressing their own erroneous belief that it was all someone else’s fault.
We have already made major changes to our youth justice system. We are well on the way to meeting our pledge to halve the time it takes to deal with young offenders and new punishments like Reparation Orders and Action Plan Orders, currently being piloted, are already proving popular with the youth courts.
But again, as this strategy shows, there is more to come. From April 2000, for example every area will have a dedicated Youth Offender Team. We will also be piloting new Young Offender Panels to deal with first time offenders pleading guilty in the youth courts and we will be rolling out our new Detention and Training Orders. Looking further ahead, the government’s new Sure Start programme and school truancy and exclusions initiatives should mean a major reduction in the numbers of younger children going on to become teenage or adult criminals.
Dealing effectively with adult criminals
The government is committed to putting the public’s protection first. Just as we must deal effectively with young offenders, so must we be intolerant of repeat offending and be much tougher in enforcing community sentences. Already we have ensured that repeat rapists, drug dealers and burglars all get stiffer sentences. But we must also reduce the number of offenders in our Criminal Justice System who go on to commit more crimes. We are therefore investing more on prison regimes to tackle drug addiction and improve literacy skills and job prospects. We are also toughening up the rules on enforcement of community sentences. In parallel we are modernising the criminal justice system, to ensure that those who do commit crimes are dealt with swiftly and effectively.
Building on these foundations, our new Crime and Public Protection Bill will extend the use of drug testing to deter drug related offending by offenders on bail and on community sentences and will enable the use of new technology to monitor the movements of a wider range of offenders. It will also restructure the Probation Service into a centrally driven unified service, aligned to police boundaries and directly accountable to the Secretary of State.
A fair deal for victims
Putting the public’s protection first also means putting the needs of victims first. Offenders cannot be brought to justice unless victims and witnesses report crimes to the police and are willing, if necessary, to give evidence in court. Yet the criminal justice system has been far too slow in recognising its responsibilities towards victims and witnesses.
The needs of victims and witnesses should be at the heart of the criminal justice system. Funding for Victim Support has now been substantially increased. Services are being improved for victims and witnesses in the magistrates’ courts. And we have introduced legislation to protect and support vulnerable victims and witnesses, including those in rape or serious sexual offence cases.
Conclusion
Crime undermines basic freedoms, particularly the freedom to live one’s life free from fear and intimidation. As a society, we cannot stand back from this. But Government action alone cannot solve the problem. Government needs to create the conditions in which individuals and communities themselves take the initiative, to take control of their neighbourhoods for the benefit of all. If we can cut crime, we can add value to every aspect of life. Reducing crime and the fear of crime enhances liberty and revitalises communities. The fight against crime is an integral part of the Government’s commitment to make Britain a better place to live.
The Rt. Hon. Jack Straw MP
Secretary of State for the Home Department
November 1999